No doubt you will have clicked on this with an eyebrow raised, born out of sheer interest or accompanied with a scoff. I know many of the readers were tired of theology class in our studies
it's important because of how central it is to religion, and religion is central to culture, they have helped explain to the curious mind of how our world was made and how they potentially fit into it.
the Yasna-creation myth
The myth started with nothing except the titular deity himself floating in nothingness. Suddenly she aquired a conciousness and subsequently decided to test out her newfound ability to think. She began small, starting with space itself, then began to form the fundamental concepts of the world. Life, death, time, soul, gravity, light and dark etc. Then she started forming the land itself, starting small with rocks and grass, and eventually reaching far higher heights of constructs with mountains, rivers, plains, forests etc.
The more and more she thought, the more her head cracked, and it is said that all these concepts and unravelled from a breach in the head and took form with her head as an anchor. Once all the things had been put into place, and the world had been created, she started to think a bit deeper on one of her concepts: soul. For each aspect of creation she had come up with she created a vessel of varying forms to embody these concepts and gave them the same gifts that she had, then went into a permanent ponder on were "life" would end up. These aspects, "Yazatas" as they are called, started creating things of their own, here under people. It's said the supreme diety Mundus himself, is also merely the aspect of light and not a full fledged creator god.
Reception and Spread
Like is the case with a lot of religious discourse, the discussions were fiery and zealous to say the least. Yasnites had been particularly critical of this creation myth's authenticity (prime reason that it relegates their god to being a mere creation of another), discrediting it's credibility by highlighting how the myth doesn't exactly explain why people turned out the way they did, nor what powers our every action (in sharp contrast toThe mundian-creation myth). However, Scholars of the time raised a counter argument to this claim by stating that what powers us is our ability to think and appreciate life. It was thought that drove Yasna to create the world around them, and this is reflected in us by our ability to think, create and appreciate aspects of life.
While not as widespread as it's mundian counterpart. The Yasna-creation myth has been noted in texts that there was a large spread of this myth in areas were there were higher concentrations of Yasna worshippers. These were typically found in the western fringes of the world where there was immense amount of flora.
The Mundian-creation myth
According to the myth, there really wasn't a Zamthjani to begin with Initally people resided on an entirely seperate plane of existence seperate from this world. There we lived in harmony with Mundus and found ourselves having a peaceful existence, it's believed that the forms that lived in this world were what would become our souls. However after a while those primordial souls began to think, and as their thoughts began so to began their emotions, and with emotions came desires. The presence of these emotions did not bother Mundus at first, but as they developed and their emotions became more intense, incidents began to occur. This seperate plane of existence, called Paradis by the Mundians (which we today refer more colloquially as
The Aetherium) , could not accommodate these newly developed desires and they became erratic. As a result of this, the realm became unstable, and Mundus expelled all of them from Paradis. The observable world was then created as a place to accomodate us, and our newfound needs. Mundus proclaimed that any who can cast aside these desires, would be free to return to Paradis and rejoin him in eternal peace, which led to the foundation of the Mundian faith and it's monastaries.
Reception and Spread
Given the different sources the academy has gathered over the years, it has become evident to the scholarly circles that this particular creation myth was properly the most widespread one. This is likely thanks to the effort of the Mundian circle, and their monks spreading this ideal as the old Aeonic republic spread it's influence across the known world. Given how the main body of Mundian worshippers and the republic government have been noted to have been centered somewhere in the South western parts of Zamthjani, but was relatively known by all in the south, north, west and some oral traditions from the far east.
The holy-matrimony
The matrimony myth starts out like the other myths, in an endless void with nothing but the titular deity. However what sets this myth apart is it inclusion of the other celestial bodies that are mentioned. In this endless abyss travelled two seperate bodies, who eventually found eachother in this endless void. Since both had been lonely for so long, they started conversing and eventually decided to "become one". These two celestial souls are supposed to be the earth mother and the heaven father respectively. With their marriage they conceived a world of their own, with the heaven father taking reign over the heavens and the earth mother spawing the land. With their marriage also came the birth of two new celestial bodies, the sea and the moon. With this in place they had created one happy family, with a land they would slowly dot out with more children.
Reception and Spread
this myth was largely unknown to the west, and was almost exclusively relegated to the far eastern parts of the world where it was spread by oral traditions, usually spoken by theological figures, and since correspondence with the far eastern world was largely non-existing, it was hard for the scholars to really get a proper idea of what the eastern peoples used as their basis for it. So it was largely guess work from the scholars side of things to determine. The members of this divine family are very much true, as they can be observed during the night and day, but it does not really factor in on why people or animals exist. It makes mention that the land was further dotted by children but whether this was referring to gods or man we don't know exactly. It doesn't help either that the myth is largely oral in nature, so it's prone to shift depending on the person telling it. Whether the version i outlined is the original one or just one of many thousand variants, i don't know.
The de’lunar creation myth.
Unlike other creation myths, the de’lunar creation myth shares striking similarities with The mundian-creation myth. It starts with the titular celestial body/deity being in a void, with souls running amok on the moon’s actual body. On the moon the souls ran wild, hunted, fought duels, feasted and loved. As the Aeons dragged on, weakness began to fester in the occupants. miscontent with these weak people, De’lunar created the world of Zamthjani and sent down the weak people to prove their worth Only by proving their worth and creating a story of their own would they be allowed to rejoin De’lunar on the moon.
Reception and Spread
The vast majority of scholars dismiss this particular creation myth, seeing it as incomplete and merely a product of the northern realms intense hero worship. The moon was without a doubt a thing, as many sources point out how it illuminates the sky during the night. However the myth's incomplete status stems that it doesn't explain fundamentals, Mundus creation is omitted entirely despite his presence during daylight hours. Atleast with The Yasna-creation myth he takes a role as the aspect of light (and by extension, day). Because of the "barebones" nature of the myth, most scholars ascribe it to be far more a result of philosophical tendencies of northerners rather than theological (but this hasn't stopped northern religions from adapting it).
The impact of it has been way above it's weight, as the central message of the myth provided the springboard for northern hero worship, that has led them to their dilligent work ethics and insistence on perfecting whatever skill they set out to do (In war, recklessly fighting to earn a good death). It was also quite popular among adventurers from various other parts of the world, as it provided them with a good boost of motivation, even if they didn't practice the faith entirely.
The Simesian-creation myth
Contrary to the The Yasna-creation myth and The Mundian-creation myth, the simesian-creation myth starts quite differently from others. While the other myths started in oblivion, the simesian myth instead started with an infinite sea. It is from this sea that Simesia himself arose, not long after his rise came the land in all of it’s splendour, crafted from the mud and material of the sea floor. His water gathered in great amounts at the peak of the mountains, flowing down and forming the rivers and invigorating the land with the life that was inherent from the water Uncontent with just having an empty, Simesia picked up mud from the bottom of the great ocean. Forming them into shapes and letting divine water flow through them granting them apperance similar to that of the land. Finally he flowed water to what would be our brain and granted us a semblance of his intellect.
Reception and Spread
Contrary to it’s contempories, the simesian myth atleast has solid basis in the form of biological evidence. We know that our bodies aswell as other organic life need water to sustain themselves, particularly how our brain, heart and lungs are all comprised mostly of water. Further historical sources that have been collected confirm that there was a country that existed called “Simesia”, that at some point was an empire. Although millenia before the republic it sunk into the ocean and took the empire with it, until it emerged back to the surface in the republic era (The reasons have never become clear)
This was more of a local myth that was part of Simesian culture, and also located entirely in the regions that were under their control. it was for this reason that this myth is mostly known among the former Simesian colonies aswell as maritime travellers who have conversed with local peoples.
The cultural impact was immense among the simesians, it seemed to have influenced the empire and it’s growth. but the true extent of it’s influence came to be during the republic era where it’s myth helped nationalist movements breed a racial superiority idea that lead to widescale insurrection that helped mess up the republics already fractured and inhospitable political landscape.
The Chaos Theory
The chaos theory is odd because unlike the other creation myths, this one lacks any theological framework. It rejects the idea that a greater immortal being was behind creation, and that reality simply was and the world formed through natural processes. There was no greater design, but randomness.
Scholars almost immediately threw this theory out the window, debates regarding it were barely performed and most of the time not even entertained. With the idea of a god out of the question, it brought up some terrifying questions regarding reality. Why was the things the way they are? Why is the land like this? Why do we look like we do? Why do we act like we do? Why all the evil? Atleast with the other myths, they provide explanation for these things and give some semblance of purpose (The mundian-creation myth). And how could immense magical structures like the
The Concord have possible been erected through a natural process? It was therefore rejected, because the implications were too terrifying for people who sought meaning and purpose.
Reception and Spread
The scholarly circles were impacted heavily by the theory, as it brought forward a non-theological framework for existence. It causes some scholars to be far more fervent when it came to arguing for creation myths, but some scholars also began entertaining a thought process that didn’t involve gods, but perhaps another force.
It did find popularity among existential scholars, who used chaos theory to argue for people ability of self-determination, as there was no specific grand design to everything, which in turn provided the means for people to create their own!
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